Uncharted Waters Online News & Events & Guides

When you first start sailing, the controls are a bit awkward, at least for me. This may be because of games like Voyage Century/Bounty Bay. Let me explain, in those games the way you turn your boat in battles is that you hold the button down for the direction you wish to go. If you want to turn left, hold it down till your ship turns that way. In Uncharted Waters Online it is a bit different. As you hold down the button a marker on a compass shaped dial will turn. When it lands on the direction you want to face, you stop there. Now if you hold down the button like how I am used to from the aforementioned games, you will end up going in circles. So if you don't pay attention it could take some getting used to master the controls of sailing and battling at sea. I don't blame the game for this, more that I was spoiled by Voyage Century's controls during battles.

The battle system itself at sea is fairly neat. When you target and go to battle with an enemy you are placed in a special area. You will first notice two areas on either side of your ship which shows your firing range and width. There will also be an outer circle which will label the battle area. As long as both of you are in the battle area the fight with commence, but if either of you manage to get out of range, then the battle will end prematurely. This is a great way for if you get in a battle and it seems to be going down quick which you can try to escape without losing your cargo, or a good way to cut off your enemy if it looks like they are trying to get away. The layout itself is simplistic in a good way so that it isn't too confusing with a low learning curve. But as you learn more you may find tactics that you can use to your advantage. Like how to position yourself in your targets blind spot, or if you feel like a boarding type person instead of cannon fire, how to corner your enemy so you can get close enough to ram them and start a melee fight. This leads into one of my disappointments. The boarding fights in the game, at least vs. the NPCs are done automatically. You don't see your character actually board the ship and fight the NPC crew with your own crew to help you out. I actually did expect this since there are melee fights in the game.